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Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of fantasy short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

14980+ Fantasy Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. Though fantasy is well known for its epically long sagas, fantasy short stories can deliver all the genre’s best attractions with one punch — or, shall we say, in one fiery dragon breath?

Fantasy Short Stories – Page 5 of 999

Dujon’s Symphony of Destiny

Submitted to Contest #299

Once upon a time there lived a donkey named Dujon. He loved to sing and imagined that he would become the greatest singer in the World and the people would crowd in front of his house to hear him sing. The soothsayer who was responsible for instilling this idea in him, also taught him how he should achieve it. He told him to go to a particular temple once every week and bow before the deity to say a prayer. After that he should donate $1 to the deity. Dujon practiced regularly and went to the temple weekly to donate $1. The soothsayer, ho...

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For The Decisions You Make.

Submitted to Contest #299

The door split open with a crack. Old wood splintered into three or four great pieces as the ogre of a man on the other side dropped his maul into it; the sound of an old tree snapping with the wind and lightning of a storm. As they crossed the threshold they revealed themselves. They were a company of three: The Warrior, who had been younger once but was now scarred and worn. His armor rattled like a catacomb as he walked. What hair of his remained was brown with scattered grey streaks. The Wanderer, who was still young and graceful. She wa...

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No Tricks

Submitted to Contest #299

“All right, kids,” I say, holding the pen upright with two fingers. “Watch the pen very closely.” As I wave my other hand around in vague circles, I steal a glance at my audience, and suppress a sigh of disappointment.Twenty or so kids, all of them somewhere around seven or eight years old, sit in folding chairs arranged before me. Here and there, a small face is pointed my way, an expression of rapt attention, verging on wonder, gracing their features. Most of them, however, clearly couldn’t care less. They slump in boredom, shift and fidge...

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Leprechauns Beware: Gold Costs Blood!

Submitted to Contest #299

"Leprechauns Beware: Gold Costs Blood!" That's the sign that hangs above Grimhollow Gate, the entrance to Dwarfton, where I live with my parents in our underground stone hovel. My dad is Dwarfton’s high chief. He’s brave, he’s strong, he’s ruthless, the scar across his face a reminder to all that no one messes with Durgan Blooddeep. Ever. He single-handedly caught and slew a group of thirty leprechauns looking to steal our gold.“I wish I was more like dad,” I say to Mum, as I pull on my favourite pyjamas. The pattern is of fierce dwarf faces...

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The Åströms' Chronicles: Trapped, Part 3

Submitted to Contest #300

The night slowly gave up as the rays of light grew thicker and brighter, with the sun slowly yet inevitably rising above the horizon.Varg lay in the glade, looking at the trees above his head, their leaves swaying in the light breeze, his clothes soaking with dew.Varg was glad he was where he was – in the glade where Fiske would teach him swordfighting every single day before he passed away.Varg always knew that Fiske was going to leave him, as it was the natural course of things.Little did Varg know that the glade he was lying in after the ...

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Theo Whimble and the Avo-King Prophecy

Submitted to Contest #299

Theo Whimble had always felt a little pitiful behind the library desk. Filing away ancient cookbooks, shushing children mid-snack, and once getting pelted with a rogue plum during Food Literacy Week, it was a quiet life, full of laminated cards and expired dreams.That all changed the day he opened Ye Olde Recipes & Revelations: Volume 5, and a single sentence glowed gold on the page:"He who mashes the green shall rule the scene."Theo rubbed his eyes, thinking he was still half asleep. He'd been in a bit of a rut lately, questioning wheth...

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The Breasts of Destiny

Submitted to Contest #299

mild sexual content and drug useJust a few more sentences and I’ll be done. I poured myself another scotch, proud of my work.A battle was lost. A battle was won. The princess was saved. The prince now wanted his just reward.They met on the battlefield at the top of a hill. She had held her breath—and her ample triple-Z bosom—as she watched her prince defeat his foe. Her tiny waist amplified her ample buttocks. She finally exhaled, then began breathing rapidly in and out as she watched her hero approach.He was excited too. The prince had the ...

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Birds of a Feather

Submitted to Contest #299

Two long time neighbors met over the backyard fence. “So how's things down at the mill?”“Oh, you know how we millers are. We keep grinding them down and spitting them out. What about at the winery? Any good news there?”“Heard some good ones through the grapevine just yesterday.”“I can't wait to hear but I'll let you tell all of us at once when we get together over at the park. We plan on meeting between the telephone poles. We'll have a bird's eye view of the lay of the land and won't get our wires crossed.”“Sure, everyone can listen closely...

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How to Spot a Witch (Step 1: Deodorant)

Submitted to Contest #299

It was a cool, late fall day when we met. The leaves were just beginning to litter the ground in a cascade of yellows, oranges, and browns, crunching under my feet as I walked to the high school’s entrance. It’s still hard to believe that we’re in high school now. Ninth grade. Young adults, young professionals, or whatever other bullshit the principal said to us at orientation.It’s been like a month. I should be used to it by now. The intensive workload, the trauma of changing and showering after gym, and students with easily a foot on me an...

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The Jester’s Tale

Submitted to Contest #299

Chocolate and cheese Are sure to please The maddest dreams Are made of theseThere was Dagonet, King Arthur’s jester, cartwheeling around the room while balancing a platter of cheese and chocolate and singing!Little Plump Jo had always been subject to vivid dreams. Sometimes she could remember them in detail; but mostly they vanished at the call of the alarm clock. Sometimes they were scary, sometimes heartwarming, sometimes amusing.Often her dreams were based on incidences of the previous day or solving problems in her current life situatio...

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THE PURR-FESSIONAL: THERAPY SESSIONS FOR THE TRAUMATIZED PET

Submitted to Contest #299

I didn't ask for this job. Most cats dream of professional napping, competitive judgmental staring, or Olympic-level indifference. Me? I somehow became the Dr. Phil of the pet world, except with actual intelligence and without the mustache.The thing about intelligence is that it's a curse. When you're the smartest creature in a three-block radius, the problems of lesser beings inevitably become your burden. That's how I ended up running an unlicensed therapy practice out of my human's home office in the quiet suburban nightmare of Maple Ridg...

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Too Many Beds

Submitted to Contest #299

Drystan pulled me closer, one hand holding his tattered cloak above our heads. The worn fabric was useless against the torrential downpour that had lasted almost three days now. I was frozen to the core, teeth clattering, but that didn’t stop the single spark of desire that flamed when our bodies touched under the cloak. Our feet splashed through the puddled cobblestone streets, my old leather boots squishing and squashing their way from inn to inn. We’d been on the road for days, and I was in sore need of a warm bed. Unfortunately, all...

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Monster Contest

Submitted to Contest #299

In a dingy basement with cracked concrete walls, a CRT television sputters to life from atop a white plastic table. A large brown beetle, which had been hiding under a corner of the TV, skitters off to find a new shadow away from the light and hum of this new disturbance. The screen produces a hazy image that loops through the top back to the bottom, repeating a tumbling splay of colors like a clumsy waterfall. Eventually the picture settles.The first channel shows a sporting match, a gridiron contest, but with rusty earth replacing the trad...

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Bodyguard

Submitted to Contest #299

(This story contains mentions of sickness)I am Kazuo Nishikawa, a prince from the royal family. Since I was born I have always been weak, so fragile that my parents deemed me as 'sick' my whole life. Recently though, I really have been sick. My parents worry for me. I try to ignore my sickness and push past it, but days like today I find it hard to keep being active. So, my father had to find another way to keep me safe and well, he feared I was truly on my deathbed.~:-------------------------------------------------------------------:~“Prin...

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Gostly Encounters of the Fourth Kind

Submitted to Contest #299

Content warning: graphic sexual depictions, but it's for comedic purposes rather than erotic. I, an arch-demon, fear the spirits of the dead like an elephant fears a mouse. My human companion, though concerningly easy to possess, can’t see ghosts and fears nothing.I accepted his contract because he was lonely and naive and only asked for a friend. It was an easy job, and I desperately needed work to replenish my reservoir of souls after being thrown through a wormhole to Earth during a losing battle in Hell’s war with Heaven. I never thought...

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RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

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